“The David Goldstein Show” tonight on Newsradio 710-KIRO

Finishing up a nine day broadcasting binge, I’m still in free-form mode tonight on “The David Goldstein Show”, 7PM to 10PM on Newsradio 710-KIRO.

Seattle P-I political columnist Joel Connelly is scheduled to call in from Chicago during the 8PM hour, to give us the old guard, legacy media take on the events at the Yearly Kos convention, and I’ll be taking other YK reports as they come in. Other topics tonight include congressional Democrats caving on FISA, the well-greased global warming denial machine, and why millionaires just don’t feel rich anymore: “A few million doesn’t go as far as it used to.” Poor baby.

Tune in tonight (or listen to the live stream) and give me a call: 1-877-710-KIRO (5476).

When I hear the word “Republican,” I visualize Bushies shoveling cash into private contractors’ duffel bags from the backs of pickup trucks in Baghdad while American soldiers eat rotten food supplied by Halliburton.

“The controversy over President Bush’s warrantless surveillance program took another surprise turn last week when a team of FBI agents … raided the suburban Washington home of a former Justice Department lawyer. The lawyer, Thomas M. Tamm, previously worked in … the supersecret unit that oversees surveillance of terrorist and espionage targets. … [T]wo … sources who asked not to be identified … told NEWSWEEK the raid was related to a … probe into who leaked details of the warrantless eavesdropping program to the news media. …

“The FBI raid on Tamm’s home comes when Gonzales himself is facing criticism for allegedly misleading Congress … about the surveillance program … [and] while the White House and Congress were battling over expanding NSA wiretapping authority in order to plug purported ‘surveillance gaps.’

“James X. Dempsey of the Center for Democracy and Technology said the raid … shows the administration’s misplaced priorities: using FBI agents to track down leakers instead of processing intel warrants to close the gaps.”

1 You’re right…although one bazillionaire offered Steve Raible one hell of a deal on a used 95-footer for $4 mil during the hydroplane races.

Actually, something that doesn’t get mentioned much is the contribution of the luxury-yacht industry in recent years to public transportation. Due to the demand generated for powerful, rugged, fuel-efficient, quiet Diesel engines, we now have buses that are a far cry from the teeth-rattling, soot-spewing “Jimmy screamers” of not all that many years ago.

I’m hoping the “information” that highly paid shills for the right have convinced a majority of Americans not to believe in evolution and global warning is in and of itself propaganda. If this is actually happening, I can’t wait for the American Institute of Coffin Manufacturers to convince us that we can all fly by jumping off of tall buildings and flapping our arms.

She is right after all, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard a politician say in a semi-official communication like this that something “sucks.” Of course, it’s not like saying the f-word on the Senate floor.

Goldy: you were saying on your show tonight that this gives Darcy a kind of common touch, but this seems like a very heavy touch to me.

The original Indo-European root for fuck is likely to be *h3yebh– or *h3eybh–, which is attested in Sanskrit yabhati, Russian ебать (yebat’), Polish jebać, and Serbian јебати (jebati), among others: compare the Greek verb οιφω, and the Greek noun ζεφυρος (ref. a Greek belief that the west wind caused pregnancy).

I missed your link from the Economist in yesterday’s thread, but a few comments:

1) The Taiwanese have had, oh, about (checks calendar, subtracts 2007 from 1949) 57 years to think about this problem. While the common wisdom here is that the US military is protecting Taiwan from bad old China, I will assure you that this view is not widely held in Taipei.

2) In addition to submarines, satellites, F-18s, missiles, and all the other toys Taiwan has purchased over the years, their primary brake against Chinese influence is economic. A huge quantity of the “foreign” investment in China over the last 20 years has come from Taiwan. China is dependent on Taiwanese capital, and not only would not to anything to endanger it, they have taken steps to assure this.

During the 1996 missile crisis, when the news over in the US was announcing that the next war was about to break out, and the propaganda war between China and Taiwan was at a frenzy, the Chinese government handed down an order that any attacks of any sort on Taiwanese-owned businesses in the Mainland would be severely punished.

3) If invading Taiwan was easy, it would have been done a long time ago. A little known fact is that when the US was preparing to end WWII, Admiral Nimitz drew up a battle plan to invade Taiwan as a base for what everyone assumed was going to be a final assault on the Japanese home islands. At that time, there were about 50,000 troops in Taiwan (mostly local conscripts wearing Japanese uniforms). Nimitz’s estimate was that the US would take about 250,000 casualties to secure Taiwan. It’s an evil place to fight a battle. Dense jungles, really nasty poisonous snakes, usual Southeast Asian bullshit. Did I mention that unlike Vietnam, it’s mostly mountains? Big tall fuckers, as high as the Cascades, but covered in jungle, and riddled with secret military bases these days.

The Nimitz plan required too many American corpses. The US Army went to Luzon instead, and the rest is history.

You would have to move a LOT of troops from Mainland China to Taiwan by boat. The Normandy invasion would look small by comparison.

Of course, it’s not 1944 anymore. There are now about 250,000 active duty troops on the island, another 3 million or so reservists, and hydrophones, satellites, AWACS airplanes, F-16s, and lots of other stuff that didn’t exist 60-odd years ago.

They could hurl missiles at the island, and certainly have the capability to do so, as they have for many years. This would destroy anything worthwhile about the island that would make it worth taking. See point 2, and reread several times.

Remember as well that everyone reads this “China is the next superpower” blah blah blah. It is bullshit on a few levels. (Have I mentioned in the last 6 months or so that I really hate 95% of journalists?) China’s economy is heavily dependent upon both exports and continued foreign investment in the country. Military action against Taiwan will result in both of those things coming to a halt. At this point, a number of bad things will happen economically including a sharp contraction in growth (they need somewhere around an 8% growth rate just to keep jobs coming. No more jobs = hungry and bitchy peasants. Last revolution was caused by hungry, bitchy, underemployed peasants).

A fair quantity of China’s national wealth is held in the form of US and European bonds. Those would be frozen following hostilities. Plan on it.

I don’t like China arming up. But also remember that the days when half-educated ex-guerrillas in Mao suits ran the country is long gone. The current generation of leaders probably has a lot more in common with the leaders in the US or Europe than anyone wants to admit. They are NOT our friends, but they are also not stupid or crazy either.

(I will add that the Economist is in the category of the 5% of the journalists I like. I can say that having hung out and thrown back Scotch with two of the Economist’s Taipei-based journalists. They’re smart guys who know what’s going on. The current round of arms purchases by China is certainly designed to intimidate the government and citizenry of the island. However drawing a direct line to the idea that “ZOMG! China has enough guns to not be scared of the US! They’ll attack Taiwan soon!” is an incorrect conclusion).

@ 18 “YellowPup says: “She is right after all, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard a politician say in a semi-official communication like this that something “sucks.” Of course, it’s not like saying the f-word on the Senate floor.”

I agree that when I first heard the “sucks” word, it startled me, too. Had to replay and, yep, that’s what she said. However, thought further about it, that’s a word that I personally have used often (& I’m an old phart). I think the younger crowd would appreciate it, that she’s thinking/speaking as they do, yet not really cursing. Isn’t that the demographics which she’s trying to reach out to? Showing that she’s got some fight in her belly, so to speak? Not giving soothing little womanly tones.

Don’t know for sure, but I’m hoping that’s how her message might be received. Hoping so.

For awhike I collected swear words form different cultures. There cool thing is that the words come from different domains ..some are sex, some are personal humilation, some are excrement, some relate to the Deity, some are politcal …

I have never understood the intent of some FUs. If a lovely lady says to a guy “FU” is that a bon mot? If one guy uses that to the others, is FU a statement of gay intent?

I suspect the real menaing of FU is Rape You. But that impluies a sexist intent. I like the FU expression and so does Goldy. Is weither of us a sexist?

How about the famous Cyhaney episode with .. was it Leahy? Is Chaney a sexist?

One of my favorite FU susbtitues is Schwanztreggerkopf .. a neo German wort of my own construction. Another face is Chickshaw … but my Jpanaese teacher will nto tell me what that means.

Of course there are alos statement like “How Christian of you!” But that epithet requires too much context.

“A fair quantity of China’s national wealth is held in the form of US and European bonds. Those would be frozen following hostilities. Plan on it.”

Hmmm…could the Peoples’ Republic and Taiwan mixing it up be the deux ex machina the neocons are expecting to take care the Hocking of America they’ve conducted over the last six and a half years? No matter whether a few million people die so long as Darth Cheney can smugly claim he was right about how “deficits don’t matter”?

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